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The Wanderer of Golders Green (1985)

Introduction

It may be true that much of the wistfulness displayed by the ensuing piece was born of a long-established infatuation with Bohemian melancholy, and that my characteristic exhileration was still very firmly in place. Formed from notes committed to paper in '85, it refers largely to an evening I spent sauntering in a mournful daze through the affluent north London suburb of Golders Green.

Yet, as I remember it, this same natural exaltation was being compromised as never before by a tendency to intense depressive attacks. Furthermore, it is unquestionable that I was seeking more and more comfort through a far deadlier Bohemian favourite than mere affected discontent, ethyl alcohol.
I don't think it's too fanciful to suggest that I'd lost something between bidding farewell to the Westfield I'd known in '81 to '83, and returning to my Land of Lost Content in the autumn of 84, something hard to define perhaps, but something precious nonetheless.

I awake each morning
With fresh hope
And tranquility
I might go for a saunter
Down quiet London backstreets
Soon my aimlessness
Depresses me,
And I realise
I'd been deceiving myself
As to my ability
To relax as others do.

After my Special B.,
I bought a lager
At the Bar
And chatted to Joy.
Then Paul
Bought me another.
I appreciated the fact
That he remembered
The time he,
His gal Carol,
And Rory Downed
An entire Bottle
Of Jack Daniels
In a Paris-bound train.

I awoke around one.
I slowly got dressed.
Chatty as ever
Before the exam:
French/English translation.
Periodically I put
My face in my hands
Or groaned or sighed.
I finished my paper
In 1 hour and a half.
As I walked out
I caught various eyes
Sandra's, Judy's (quizzical) etc
I went to bed
Slept till five
Read O'Neill until 7ish
Got dressed
And strolled down
To Golders Green,
In order to relive
A few memories.

Singing songs
Brought voluptuous tears.
I snuck into McDonalds
Where I felt At home,
Anonymous, alone.
I bought a few things,
Toothpaste and pick,
Chocolate, yoghurts,
Sweets, cigarettes
And fruit juice.
Took a sentimental journey
Back to Powis Gardens,
Richness
And intensity,
Romantic
And attractive
Sad, suspicious and strange.
I sat up until 3am,
Reading O'Neill
Or writing (inept) poetry.
Awoke at 10,
But didn't leave
My room till 12,
Lost my way
To Swiss Cottage,
Lost my happiness.
Oh so conscious
Of my failure
And after a fashion,
Enjoying this knowledge.

Learn more about this author, Carl Halling.
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